“More studios WILL close and you’ll see more PC and mobile games,” he said when asked what will happen now that Microsoft’s vision of a digital future has been at least temporarily scuppered.

His next comment seemed to imply that the continued existence of used games takes a huge bite out of profits.

“I have seen the number of unique gamer tags vs actual sales numbers and it ain’t pretty,” he said, although he cannot reveal figures due to NDAs.

“I want developers who worked their asses off to see money on every copy of their game that is sold instead of Gamestop. Fuck me, right?”

Unable to recover all this supposed revenue lost to used games – which, by the way, assumes that all the people using these avenues to access games would just fork out a triple-A cover price if given no other choice – Bleszinski predicted consequences for the industry.

“Brace yourselves. More tacked on multiplayer and DLC are coming,” he said. “You’re also about to see available microtransactions skyrocket. HATS FOR EVERYONE.

“You’re going to see digital versions of your favorite games with added “features” and content to lure you to digital over disc based. ‘Do whatever it takes to keep that disc in that tray’ is the mantra of developers in a disc based world.”

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“I want developers who worked their asses off to see money on every copy of their game that is sold instead of Gamestop. Fuck me, right?”

He may be a primadonna, but you can’t argue with that. It makes me sick that every time I walk into my local EB games I can either pick up the brand new game of the month for $59.99, or a 1 week old version for $54.99. I always fork over the extra dough for a new copy, but how many mothers, fathers, and teenagers on a fixed income can say the same?

How much money is EB / Game Stop making on these games anyway? 150 – %200 profit I reckon. I’m all for consumer choice, and agree that blocking used games makes it too difficult to allow trading and borrowing amongst friends, but there has to be a better business model in place.

I predict Cliff Bleszinski creating yet another uninspired, testosterone fuelled macho gore fest shooter some time in the near future.

C WAT I DID THAR?!

The problem isn’t with consumers Bleszinski, you self obsessed douche. The problem is with creatively barren developers like yourself churning out the same uninspired piles of shit every single year because you don’t have a single bone of actual inspiration in your entire body.

I’m happy to have more hats, thanks mate. Team Fortress 2 is a bloody great game… And it’s *free*.

The main reason I buy used games is for when there are no new copies being made and used is the only route for a game that’s been out for a while. This only happens when I just heard about a old game. I don’t like downloading so I just get used. It feels better with disc tho since I like to collect the best gameplay/nostalgic experiences. It feels like I actually own it you know.

Yeah! Fuck Gamestop!They force people to steal money from game makers!

I love walking in to USED BOOK STORES and dousing the place in gasoline, because fuck them for providing an alternative choice to consumers and STEALING money from writers and publishers.

No other industry on Earth has to deal with a used market that steals all the money like in the video game industry.

There ought to be laws passed, amendments ratified and flags burned over this.

Can you imagine the idea of buying a used copy of Farenheit 451 and not having to give Ray Bradbury a check?

Do you realize that while Bradbury’s work may have made him rich, the actual number of people who read his work and didn’t pay HIM for it actually exceeds the number who did?

Imagine how much better the world would have been if all those people never got to read his writings.

Thank god we have all you brave souls ready to stand up and fight for the rights of game developers to take money from consumers who purchased (read as STOLE) a video game second hand. The idea that when someone buys a game they have the right to sell, trade, lend, or keep it makes me absolutely sick. Kill em all I say. And anyone who looks like em too.

fuck you, DRM on the console itself is much different to publishers. sony and im assuming microsoft will still allow publishers to do so on 3rd party games, and i would support these publishers as i buy new anyway but if i dont see older gsames discounted i wont even bother.

@11 – I live in the biggest city in the world and while I always do try to buy new, he is right that, sometimes, it’s impossible to find a new copy of certain titles. Show me a store with a brand new copy of Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne or Sakura Wars or Suikoden II.

I agree with Cliffy. Gamestop is the one who REALLY gets “more value” out of used games.

Scenario: A developer gets a copy of their game sold for $60. Then the owner gets bored and trades it in at Gamestop for $20. Gamestop then resells it to the next guy for $55. That guy gets bored and trades it in for $15 and Gamestop resells it for $50.

So instead of the developer getting $180 for 3 sales… they get $60 while Gamestop gets $70. Gamestop theoretically can make more money off a game than the ACTUAL developer. Does this sound right to anyone?

But I do think MS and Sony need to take some pointers from Valve (Steam). Digital games need to be better priced. Paying $60 for a digital version doesn’t fly with some people. People are wondering if there is no box, manual or disc, why isn’t there are slightly lower price.

Second, have more sales. Also, older games that can be bought brand new at physical stores for $20 cannot sell for $50-$60 digitally.

Somehow Sony and Microsoft need to show people the advantages of digital downloads and lure them in.

Ya’ know this has been a very amusing day. First MS changes their consoles direction drastically; correcting lots of the wrongs many couldn’t deal with- including their own fans like me (both Sony and MS).

Then, you’d think the well deserved backlash would’ve been suppressed at least slightly. Sadly some who claim they’re open minded never really look outside box because, low and behold, instead we get more backlash. I swear does no one think with a clear conscience anymore?

Then we have this idiot…what was your name again? Cliff Bl- who cares. Out of all the hypocrites he’s the worst. This guy is joke.

At the end of the day I love you MS for what you did earlier but as Justin Timberlake once sang: It’s too late too apologize. I’ve already reserved my PS4. Don’t worry though, I may be a fan but I’m not a fanboy. My mind is open. I can now consider the Xbox One a (somewhat)good console and will buy it sometime on down the line. Good day folks!

We’ll see studios closing at the exact same rate as we would if the XBox One’s DRM were in place, possibly slower because now many people that were planning to drop this console generation entirely because of that DRM will buy games again on consoles.

More games going to PC and mobile was INEVITABLE. There is absolutely no way that the DRM practices the XBox One had in place would have kept that from happening. The model of most companies these days is to have obscenely high budgets and do downright idiotic things to old IPs, expecting the games to sell millions upon millions of copies. They expect the impossible just because one studio out of all of them manages to sell the numbers they want. Video game companies already had an excuse lined up if they still suffered lower than expected sales in a world where XBox One and PS4 both had XBox One’s originally planned DRM, it’s called “console volatility.” Companies have shown absolutely no qualms about suggesting that they’re ready to abandon consoles with or without DRM measures. Some companies, like Sega, are doing this already.

Bleszinski likes to assume that because there are a lot of gamer tags for a game, that means a majority of those people would have bought the game brand new if used copies didn’t exist. This is ignorant, and applying personal beliefs to raw data. This is like seeing that more people DVR a show than buy DVDs of it (hypothetical example), then saying if DVR didn’t exist, everyone would buy DVDs of shows they normally DVR.

I want to see developers that make great games get the money they’re due as well, which is why it’s so great that we have a system in place where someone can buy a used game, find out just how great these companies are, and go on to buy future games by the company new at full price. I say this as someone that bought Folklore used, loved the hell out of it, and went on to get Knights Contract at new full price (though the gameplay was worse on the newer game, unfortunately).

More tacked on multiplayer, DLC, and microtransactions were inevitable too. DRM was not going to stop or even slow this, and it’s moronic to think otherwise. Multiplayer is included because there’s this overriding belief that people will think they’re getting more value out of the game if they can play it with other people. DLC and microtransactions are NOT subtle DRM measures, they’re greed-based measures of trying to dupe people into doling out more money for games they already bought. This is as absurd as suggesting that a company with totalitarian control over pricing would altruistically lower prices rather than push the limits of raising them to get more money out of consumers.

All in all, Bleszinski continues to have no idea what he’s talking about, and has fallen into the trap of the corporate greed mentality. He may be accurate about what some companies would do out of their sublime idiocy and unabashed greed, but what the companies do is an entirely different matter from if it’s right. Bleszinski’s attitude that consumers supposedly had nothing to do with the changes to XBox One’s policies in and of itself goes in line with all the excuse-making companies make for why they shouldn’t have to be bothered with actually listening to companies and adapting and improving what they do.

The companies that stop being stupid and realize who they’re actually making games for, then take the time to actually listen to that audience, are the ones that will prosper. The companies that are too ignorant to learn and adapt, meaning the ones that believe the things Bleszinski believes, are the ones that will kill themselves.

Bleszinski, the biggest asshat in all of gaming. Seriously Blinzk… why so serious? Don’t you make great games that everyone loves? Oh no, you just whine because customers are always wrong. Bad games will sell LESS with DRM, not more. If people had to continue to pay full price for 6-12 months after release (like CoD) for ALL games, people would only buy 4-5 games a year instead of 10-15 at half the cost.

Just make better games, it’s easy. Look at indie developers, they make games that are infinitely better than whatever Epic makes… and they do it with under 10 people on the development team. Some indie games are so good that the recoup their losses in days after release, sometimes even hours. These aren’t games that are fantastically long or anything…

Look at Naughty Dog. They spent what… 3 years on The Last of Us? Even though the game is horribly linear and honestly brings nothing really new into the third person shooter genre, it blows your games out of the water with the amount of detail and care that was put into the game. The levels are designed for you to explore your avenues of assault or stealth. Even though both Gears and The Last of Us have the same shooter mechanics, The Last of Us is a game that I will likely keep forever… never to sell it.

Though i would never support XBOX One with an internet DRM, i WILL support Blezinski on “the developers need to be paid for their efforts” statement. Seriously people, stop hating this guy the minute you see his name XBOX One on the title. Think about it. Would you do the hard work and let someone else like Gamestop and co take reap the benefits??

At the same time Blezinski needs to understand that requiring internet for maintaining that DRM is not acceptable at ALL. I’m glad MS did a reversal on that one.

@35 Insults are lame to read. I also think you overestimate Cliff, “god knows his intelligence”, but I agree. The average VG247 reader doesn’t know anything about major game dev. It’s hard to have a wise opinion about something that you don’t really know anything about.

@11 I live Brooklyn, NY. I would rarely get a used game, but when I do it has to be at a store near my house. (which is gamestop ;-; ) The gamestop near my house doesn’t have older games from like 2008 new for obvious reasons. I don’t order fresh ones online since I like the feeling of going back home with a game :P. Still have that nostalgic feeling when getting a game from when I was kid.

@38 You’re funny. :p I remember when I was around 8, the first game I had, I went home with it, installed it, just to see that I couldnt play it because my computer was so bad … But I was still super exicted!

If Sony and Microsoft could release a game demo system ala Onlive (you can try virtually all their games for like 10-15 min via game streaming, no lengthy downloads needed) it would probably help avoid gamers from buying a lousy game and being stuck with it.

They are going that route but it is up to the dev to do it as they have to pay for it. Once Gaikai goes live within the first year of release you will be able to spectate your friends playing the game so you can gauge that way as well. Just need a high bandwidth in order to watch it at high resolutions let alone play it. Also Xbox One cannot stream games so devs would have to actually make a demo for said game on that system.

Who is Cliffy B? He worked with the company Epic which created Gears of War, the Unreal engine, and more. He is arguably the most well known developer out there or at least top 5.

While I believe he is by no means an idiot I do believe he is wrong on his stance or I should say his thinking fundamentally flawed. As many have already said he assumes that the money game stop makes from used game sales would instead be spent on full or near full priced games. However given the current economic state this is unlikely and any increase would be small to what he hopes for. As #7 said before he shot down his own argument those who are on a fixed income are more likely to go for the cheaper game.

I have in fact read an article from a company similar to gamestop that was trying to get started a while back but the idea was to give customers more in trade in value and give money back to the publishers. The fact of the matter is both Sony and Microsoft have had ample time to place themselves as a competitive digital market as both have pretty strong digital libraries as is. In fact they did quite the opposite charging a great deal more in many cases for digital copies as opposed to what was being sold in say Walmart for brand new copy of old games.

So you will have to excuse me when I don’t believe that the growing market of DLC and micro transactions will not stop over night when the consoles can’t even do digital competitively. Not to mention you already see micro transactions from PC games that you will never be able to see used in a gamestop.

Props to him for sticking to his guns unlike Microsoft. It’s ME3 all over again.
Anyway, am I the only one who’s actually disappointed that we’re now ending up with 2 very similar machines?
And more importantly, they haven’t done any changes to their XBLA publishing policy.

Cliffy stop being a bitch, I’m pretty sure used game sells didn’t hurt his bank account. And to all you all hating on gamestop and other similar stores. What’s the problem, they got the right to run their business the way they see fit. You know we have these places called pawn shops that buy used things from you then sell them at a mark up, sound familiar. Try taking a used game to a pawn shop and see how much they give you for it, guarantee you it won’t be close to $20. If these developers don’t want to lose money due to used game sales, then make better games that people don’t want to trade in.

i can’t believe all this. i am disgusted by the cheap tricks and lies, by the weak and yet extremely agressive and ignorant attempt of ms to dominate the market. what they tried to pull off there was a threat to the games industry as a whole in the long run. the attempt to be able to dictate and fully controll everything. the idea of corporate fascism as i like to call it. they still are a threat. you guys can say what you want. to me it’s chrystalclear: if you buy a x1 you’ll just cut your own throat. you’ll help to kill creativity and diversity in gaming. that’s the only truth to be found right here. the rest is just wishy washy pr blablabla excuses and apologies to make the vision a reality a few years later. this industry begins to stink on a whole new level now. bleszinsky just plays the sad clown right now while in fact he’s the puppet of pennywise the it clown. in the end, cliffy is just a tool.
i am not a fanboy. most people here know that i played a lot on 360 but i deeply believe it’s still very very wrong to buy into the xbox brand and i am more and more thinking about quitting this hobby as a whole or at least to go pc and nintendo. to me that could be damage controll.

@54 exactly.. he stays in the news simply by beng a dick and skewing the whole discourse towards investing more into games and selling them for a higher price. Which basically means, that he wants a model where the dev is the biggest beneficiary. which is fair. but the stuff that he is suggesting is just unsustainable.
It’s thinking like this which has cap-sized AAA industry, not the used games sales, or the rentals. it’s like what nintendo said “why dont you just make better games cliffy, and people wont rent it”
like the fact that I am about to buy the SoTC collection on my ps3 when I already have both ICO and SotC for my Ps2. those are games worth keeping.not “Grays of war”
make a better game cliffy or GTFO

Well, this from a guy who blames pirates for the poor sale of the PC version of Gears of War. Riiiiight. It had absolutely nothing to do with GFWL Gold requirement at the time of release. You know, where us PC guys were supposed to pay 50 bucks a year to play multiplayer …. that was another stupid business decision. And I bought Gears of War new!! Just not full priced, are you crazy, I dont do that, buy full priced games. I wait.

All the people blaming the game shops don’t seem to understand. I work at GAME in the UK and because publishers obviously want to make as much money as possible, we make about £3 on a new game. Is it any wonder why we push used? Also if we trade a new title for £20 and sell it for £35, that money goes into keeping the shop open, paying wages, rent, electric etc. If we didn’t sell used, we would close down, simple as that. The publishers know this, which is why when GAME was in administration Sony, and a few others helped us out.

If this guy really thinks that everyone who has bought a used game would have bought it full price new, given no other option, he is deluded.

@33: “Would you do the hard work and let someone else like Gamestop and co take reap the benefits??”

I would do the hard work and reap the benefits of still making at least enough money to continue doing it as my job (complete with benefits) and hopefully making something people consider to be very meaningful to them. Considering all these companies that cry about used games and pirating somehow manage to survive, and manage to turn a profit in years where they make games that are actually good, I have good reason to believe this works out perfectly fine. Capcom, Squeenix and even Sega all manage to stay in business even though most of what they put out sucks, so I sincerely doubt the “problem” is anywhere near as bad as these people claim it is. The only years in which they decide they need to shut down studios and go through layoffs are years where they make games that suck.

@7 You can’t just say “Oh I get what he’s saying and fuck EB & GameStop.” What solution would you suggest? I agree Devs deserve used game revenue for sure. The way I see it, there has to be a way to make used games a win/win for developers as well as consumers, because I firmly believe that used games are a huge part of our hobby and industry that hasn’t been properly set up yet. How can we make it gravy on both sides of the game?

@nikk900
He’s just your typical rich asshole that fell ass backwards into money and doesn’t give a shit about the working class or what kept him in business in the first place.

I never worked in gaming retail, so I didn’t have any idea of how little brick and mortar shops make per new game (though, I know you don’t make profits on new consoles sold). Still, the prices your business charge for used titles are ridiculous, even if it is what keeps the business running. Still, as many good arguments have been brought up, there are used markets for cars, books, music and movies and these do not negatively impact the manufacturers, producers, writers and musicians in any real way.

I see the video game industry in the same way as I would the American automotive industry as it faced collapse with all the crooked shit happening on Wall Street. The industry stagnated itself and ran on archaic practices, fueled by greed, consistently failed in matching the quality and fuel efficiency of its foreign competitors and needed a major overhaul. That’s the current gaming industry. It needs to evolve in a way that draws in more revenue, and that isn’t paying some dickhead in a suit more money, or boosting up the budget, it’s in finding cost effectiveness and relaying the savings on to the consumer so the consumer is more willing to give the money AND attract new buyers. This is something even I understand and I don’t work in the fucking game industry.

So, Queefy B, shut your little whore mouth and save your ass by doing some serious renovations to the broken system, or continue to whine as you continue flushing yourself down the drain.

Hmm, doesn’t selling sued games lead to more sold games too?
Lets say the new Shooter 6 is out, costing 50$. Now I have Shooter 1-5 already… hm, I could sell those to some people and get 10$ each, thus be able to buy Shooter 6 at nearly no cost.

If I could not sell my old games, I might wait some months until the game is out for about half or quarter that price.

And funny thing, only some games are traded in, not all. I still have all my Final Fantasy cardridges/Discs/DVDs, all the Suikoden parts, all SMGT games, Chronotrigger, Secret of Mana, generally all Square games from the SNES and PS1-2 time… though I did trade in the games I did not enjoy or did not think it is worth to keep them. Most of them shooters and sport games now that I think about it. Mind you, I do not buy those anymore, since I had my share of it already.

I was intrigued by what someone at nintendo said about this recently. They apparently have numbers that suggest their first party games get traded in less often. People just keep them, because they love them and they are fun. ( or so claimed the source)

Then I realized that you don’t see as many people buying blu rays or vinyls and then selling them a few months later.

Is there something about this generation’s crop of games that make them feel disposable and less precious. Because even in my most broke days of youth, I for one would never have traded in say NES Legend of Zelda… or Mario 3.

1. More PC games? Freaking great!
2. EA had Online Pass for so long. Did they had “less” DLC because of that…? NOPE.
3. What games can be affected? Only these which new installments are coming out every year. Who cares about future of Call of Duty or Assassin’s Creed? Yea, they cost very much, but it;s because of publishers decisions.

So this guy is actually under the illusion that what, 50%? More? Of his player base, i.e. kids with no income – would be able to convince their parents to pay £40 per game? What planet is this guy on? Those people that trade in games and buy mainly second hand do so because they can’t afford to be gamers otherwise. Make it impossible for them to afford your product and all you do it alienate them from the market completely.

I agree it’s shit that retails get the slice of tradein profit and not developers but you know what? That is a solvable problem – reduce your games to £20 each and people will just buy them new, sales will quadruple, and tradeins will drop because everyone bought new.

Alternatively Valve, MS and Sony could have the ability to do preowned/tradeins for digital titles, with a slice of the profits going back to the devs.

Bear in mind the former would make retailers slightly worse off (more stock needed) and the latter would pretty much destroy retailers. He can bitch about retailers until he’s blue in the face but if they die off, where are those people with shite download speeds going to get their games from? Yet another market alienated. And also, retailers get such a thin slice of the profits on new games that we could argue were it not for tradeins many of them would already be struggling or dead.

I really don’t think he understands supply and demand, or demographics. He thinks everyone would run to pay full price for every title if that were the only option they had. That would never happen..

Cliff needs a education in basic economics. If a dev cannot support it’s bloated development costs with the revenue it makes then they will not survive with that model. The solution is to switch to a model that works.

No other industry are trying to scupper the second hand industry. Lets say I buy a couch second hand. The company that made the couch doesn’t require my paying them to sit on the left hand side. This is nothing but greed.

Stop writing about this attention-whoring asshole!!! Tweeting a few tweets doesn’t make him any more relevant, which he hardly ever was!
The Xbox One is just an average console now with “the power of the cloud” torn to shreds as well as any features it had over PS4 like game sharing.
It’s unique feature is just Kinect now! KINECT!!!

What does this man expect.. How about stop blaming the consumers and Gamestop and find an alternative.. What if you simply pushed digital and put sales on it to always beat Gamestop’s prices.. Such a smart idea right?

So people wanting to be treated like customers not criminals is all of a sudden a bad thing? Gears of War is basically the Big Mac of third person shooters. Get this bro fisting, greedy, jackass the fuck outta here already.

“I want developers who worked their asses off to see money on every copy of their game that is sold instead of Gamestop. Fuck me, right?”

That’s understandable but guess what Cliffy, many people don’t want to pay full price for your run-of-the-mill game. Just like how I won’t pay for an expensive movie ticket to watch an average looking/sounding flick. If you want to sell more, either make better quality products or adjust the price accordingly.

Anyway, he’s just butt hurt cause M$’s u-turn just proved him wrong. Time for him to fuckin grow up..

“If you have a great game, you won’t trade it in, period.”
Patrick Bach

“We have been able to step back and say that we are not taking any technological means to impact trade-in and we are confident that if we build great content, then the consumer will not want to trade in our games,”
Fils-Aime

Because retailers like Gamestop and Game have a stranglehold on the market. If a new game is cheaper on digital stores they will refuse to stock the item on the shelf which publishers need because physical still is majority of revenue.

@90

Cliffy B was the guy that made a game that sold 19 million units. So in his mind and other publishers, he did make a quality product.

That is only way to gauge a game’s success.

@91

FUnny because I sold my Wii and all my games for it along with my gamecube and its games. SO They didn’t make a “quality” product.

My take is that used games are the industries own fault. It has created monsters in all of us. Hungry for new and as of yet unexperenced content. We have become the perfect eating machines. And we are constantly starving.

It is, all of it, the result of devaluation and over saturation of the very medium that we crave. We as gamers crave content at an alarming rate. Making the bulk of it feel very average, very mundane. Disposable. And when what was once coveted becomes so meaningless. So ordinary why shouldn’t it be discarded toward the promise of something flashy, tasty and worthy? Something we haven’t yet eaten.

You are right, I never traded away a single NES game. I kept them all. They were special. Ofc, I didn’t own as many of them as I do PS360 games. And maybe because of that they held more value, maybe only in my mind and heart. But I kept them.

Then again there was no multi billion dollar store chain pumping me for trade ins each and every time I went to buy a new game either. Welcome to new age capitalism folks. And the corperate shaping of consumerism. And with it brings a hungry new gamer. One that eats meaningless bits of entertainment as if its very life hangs in the balance.

And look at us now. Thread and post, one after another, asking about, talking about new games. Games not out yet, how amazing these unseen, unproven gems will be. We must have more, too late to stop now. What happens if you nor I, nor anyone for that matter buys the PS4 or Xbone? What if we stick with our current collections(provided we have them, Mr. B. would like us to believe we don’t have any games left cause we sell them all). What happens if we just stop?

The very people complaining about second games, suddenly can’t sell new ones. Oh the sweet taste of irony, a bit bitter really.

That is to say that the very machine that created us, the ever consuming gamer, would dry up if we collectively stopped buying. If we lost our appetite for content, the industry would starve to death.

Yet the problem, for them is that they made us too well. Too perfect. So deep is our hungry that we have to have more. Often times more then we can afford. Here we are now, entertain us. So many of us trade away those already used up and now worthless morsels of old code toward new experiences. Often new games, often new to us, old, second hand games.

Funny really, the industry could well be consumed by the very thing is created.

In the end, Cliffy has a point. A couple of them really. The world that MS envisioned isn’t going to work. You can’t take precieved freedoms away from the very people you need. MS needs us to buy Xbones, piss us off and we won’t. But they can not control the consumer. It is very hard to put the cat back into the bag once it gets loose.

The rules that apply to books, flim and music are not the same as all those mediums have multiple ways to make revenue. Where games only have one. THe industry has tried to make other avenues but what do people do, bitch about those as well. You can’t have your cake and eat it too. SOmething has to give its either second hand sales go away which bring more money in the industry which will allow the industry to be more open with prices similar to Steam or developers and Publishers buckle under the weight of people buying used.

Total Biscuit’s view which is actually far more accurate for those wanting second hand sales.

You can’t compare books or even music is a stretch. Films yes. Because the way these things are marketed and consumed. And the budgets that go in to them. If everyone watches for and waits for Netflix, the theater is in trouble. And with so much diversity and choice to consume, the theater is in trouble. That is why they now make Netflix wait after their PPV deals.

@92
My comment wasn’t aimed at Cliffy’s games per se but to games in general. I agree with the assessment that if a game is great, you won’t trade it unless you really need to for some reason. I don’t agree when you say that if second hand sales go away, that would bring more money in the industry. Let’s face it, if it wasn’t for the second hand market, many games wouldn’t be played by that many people and the only way to build a franchise is if people play the bloody games.

Also, it’s not the consumers’ fault publishers don’t do enough to explore other ways of selling their products or not having control over the second-hand market.

Anyway, Cliffy’s totally on the wrong here because he puts the DRM ball on the console manufacturers’ court when it’s a publishers’ issue.

Django Unchained cost 100 million to make. That’s more than the average videogame isn’t it?

It made 400 million dollars at the box office, before ever touching DVD or streaming markets.

You don’t have to only look at the bigger movies either, because unlike the games industry, the movie industry doesn’t just make the one kind of product based on the same exact recipe, so some movies may cost less to make, but ultimately still bring in a nice profit.

Take Drive for example. Budget of around 15 million, earned 77 before hitting DVD. Beasts of the Southern Wild, around a million dollars. Made 20.

Maybe the games industry just isn’t very good at producing and selling their merchandise.

Nice try but movies are much more accessible and you don’t need special hardware in order to access them. You pay 10$ and you are entertained for a hour or two. You should watch the video because TB puts in a way I can’t not in words anyways. Movies have a much bigger audience, accessibility, multiple avenues in making revenue.

ALso has been in the market many decades before the game industry. And how the Movies are made are not the same as games. Every person on a team in a game is making at least 40k throughout its development. THe movie industry is built on contracts that are filled within a certain amount of time(typically 6 months to a year) and they move on can’t do that with a production team in the game industry.

“Fact is, (the winning) movies have made a profit long before they reach those other avenues.”

Still even if a movie bombs it has a chance to make that revenue back through Netflix, TV, DVD sells. Games only have one avenue.

@103 So what? Movies range between one to several hundred millions of dollars.

The smaller movies may gross less, but they often earn more on the dollar than a movie that costs 100 million.

It’s a bonafide investment, but more importantly it opens the medium up to new talent, it shows people amazing things that may not be bankable at a budget of 100 million, and it may end up inspiring the guys making the expensive stuff, and as such the medium grows and movies mature.

Guys like Martin Scorsese and Sam Raimi were basically indie. Look at them now.

The videogame industry could have the exact same thing, with smaller studios making smaller games, with lots of benefits for the industry as a whole, and unlimited potential to follow, but they choose not to. That’s entirely on them.

I think anyone would agree that videogames are moving forward at an alarmingly slow rate. New people just aren’t coming in fast enough, and obviously mass producing shooters and endless sequels backed by huge marketing budgets isn’t quite the trick it’s cracked up to be.

Maybe the industry should start caring about the actual merit and quality of the craft. That’s how movies came to arrive at where they are today. It didn’t happen without guys like Charlie Chaplin who actually took some responsibility.

It makes me want to puke to see an industry that runs itself that way, and then whines whenever the money doesn’t seem to magically roll in, like the whole world’s conspiring against them.

CLiff is an idiot. Try living in the real world CLiff. Gears of war was made for less than 10 million, and makes a 180 million in a matter of 3 weeks.
Movies like Superman and Batman are made for $200 million to $300 million. I totally see the risk there…

“The videogame industry could have the exact same thing, with smaller studios making smaller games, with lots of benefits for the industry as a whole, and unlimited potential to follow, but they choose not to. That’s entirely on them.”

Because gamers want the best and newest tech, with content filled to the brim. Can’t have that with a smaller team. Witcher wouldnt be made nor would half the triple A’s we have.

@106 … According to publishers. That’s an easy statement to make if you’ve never actually tried to serve people something different. It might bring new people in, it might expand the industry.

I’m sure someone said something equally foolish when people wanted to make movies about more than just a character kicking another in the ass so he could chase him around the block.

Publishers are directly responsible for growing their business and cultivating their market. If they don’t try to expand, then obviously, they’ll be trying to squeeze bucks out of the exact same crowd indefinitely.

@103 and 106 Peeps also want the best cars, best house, best of everything, but they can`t have it all, so they settle for less. That`s where being realistic comes in.

“ALso has been in the market many decades before the game industry. And how the Movies are made are not the same as games. Every person on a team in a game is making at least 40k throughout its development. THe movie industry is built on contracts that are filled within a certain amount of time(typically 6 months to a year) and they move on can’t do that with a production team in the game industry.”

Lower wages, make less interactive movies, make another business model, change focus, cut stuff, start using realistic sales projections, cut down on marketing, keep your games relevant longer, reward people for being loyal, prioritize differently, just like every fucking other industry in the world.

Being 20 years in the industry as Cliffy B seems so proud of is part of the problem, he´s part of that sick culture and it`s that corporate culture that needs to change, not basic consumer behaviour.

Where is this “squeezing” coming from? DLC and microtransactions? WHy shouldn’t publishers push that? Games have been the same price for decades ignoring inflation when games should be over 100$ but they aren’t. So Publisher look for other ways to bring in revenue for games and for the most part it has worked. The entire mobile market is built on microtransactions, or ad based. Games will not be going cheaper. THere is no way for that to happen and not with the demand of the gamers. SOmething has to give. More DLC and microtranctions or removing second hand sales to ensure that money is coming in. Pick your poison.

@108
Yeah you don’t know what you are talking about and its quite obvious. As someone that works in the field I know I should be paid more than I do now but here you are saying lower wages. Not sure how interactive movies come into play but people actually like those, Heavy Rain for example. There is no way to gauge on how much your game will or will not make.

@109 Inaction and action are two sides of the same coin, and both have consequences.

Obsessing over the same group of customers, figuring out ways to squeeze two bucks out of them instead of one, is really never going to be as good of an investment as creating brand new customers in my opinion.

It takes balls to accomplish that, sure, but risk and reward are often proportionate to one another.

Videogames is still a frontier that’s waiting to be conquered in my opinion. It just needs people who actually acknowledge that, and want to do the job.

I’m not impressed with an industry that spends this much time coming up with new business models, and so little time coming up with new games. In my opinion it’s entirely logical that a well that gets drilled so hard would begin to dry up.

The nickle and dime mentality of publishers is arguably not an appealing side to videogames as a medium. Does Hollywood or the music business constantly grab for your wallet like that? It stands to reason that some people would be offended to spend 50 bucks on a piece of entertainment, just to give a publisher the chance to ask them for another 10, 20, or 40.

Hahha you are expecting Publishers that put in 40-60 million into games to try to make new types of games, fat chance. Triple A in all industry is built on avoiding risk to going after the lowest common denominator. Like it or leave it that is how it is.

” to spend 50 bucks on a piece of entertainment, just to give a publisher the chance to ask them for another 10, 20, or 40.”

THen don’t pay for the DLC, they aren’t grabbing a gun and putting it to your head and say buy this shit. You have a choice and really this DLC and microtransaction won’t be going anywhere infact it will be coming out more, CLiffy B is right even if he comes off as a douche.

@109 Condescending BS, if the average wage of a team member is 40k, try and compare that with other industries average wage – lol! You could easily lower wages and give higher bonuses as an example.

“There is no way to gauge on how much your game will or will not make” more BS, are you seriously suggesting that publishers or developers don`t have any estimates and just fund stuff blindly, sure there’s no guarantees but if your first game sold 2 million copies, surely expecting your next game in the series to sell 5 million is a bit of a stretch.

Classic examples of the sick game industry culture right there IMHO.

We must have more money, consumers are cheating us, no one outside our industry can possible imagine how it feels, sob.

@111 People are obviously happy to “leave that”, seeing as the industry keeps whining about how little they’re making.

Publishers who choose to purely make 40-60 million dollar games don’t get to bitch. That’s a problem of their own creation, and it’s not easy to sympathize with when they’re being outplayed by other entertainment industries, that are far more adept at expanding their market, because they bank on a far wider range of products, and as such they can afford to split a 10 dollar fee (maximum for a ticket) or 15 dollar fee (maximum for an album) between them and a movie theater or retailer, and still make a ton of money.

Either you grow or you perish.

In terms of the nickle and dime…

Sure, “you have a choice”. Just like you have a choice when a facer stops you on the street and asks you if you want to help improve the groundwater in Guatemala for a small fee of 15 dollars a month. Does that make it less fucking annoying, or less of a fucking bore?

I have a choice, so I guess I should thank him for the offer? Bullshit.

There’s a sign I see on most American businesses I come across that says “No Soliciting” – Clearly not everyone is happy to have all this “amazing value” jammed down their throats 24-7.

“if the average wage of a team member is 40k, try and compare that with other industries average wage – lol! You could easily lower wages and give higher bonuses as an example.”

I had a choice in the matter it was higher wage but I receive no bonuses or I get paid less and receive bonuses. I am not a moron. I have been on this world long enough to know that companies will be the first to cut you when its time to write the bonus checks. I went with higher pay so I can then have cushion so when they do lay me off. I don’t deal in promises.

@113

THe music analogy doesn’t work as the artist actually gets his money from the publisher just to make another album not to mention the artist really only makes money through concerts not the albums sales which numbers have been failing for the music industry.

““No Soliciting” – Clearly not everyone is happy to have all this “amazing value” jammed down their throats 24-7.”

Tell that to the people that buy the 15$ map packs. Both EA and Activision have proven to make revenue off DLC so obviously its not as bad as you are projecting.

The music industry has also been woefully mismanaged over the years. Instead of investing in digital, they threw away both their money and their earnings fighting it.

Now, finally, they’ve given up on fighting it, and suddenly they’re making money again.

If nothing else, that gives you an example of another industry that spent a lot of energy bitching and moaning, raising prices and losing customers, but only truly started to move ahead again once they stopped and took a bit of responsibility for themselves.

Some people like to look at guys like Ricitiello or Kotick or Bleszinski like they’re Popes. They know everything. If they say doom, it’s doom. I think reality is a bit more open to suggestion.

In terms of the nickle and dime…

Obviously the industry is still doing poorly, so clearly it’s not a miracle cure for anything.

You can’t acccurately measure how many people choose not to buy a game because of micro-transactions. You can only accurately count the guys who jump in, so it’s very easy to claim a positive result because you’re holding a few dollars you didn’t have before, while you have no idea of how many you lost in the process.

Personally I think people buy games, or movies, or music, to be entertained. Not to be solicited to.

“Personally I think people buy games, or movies, or music, to be entertained. Not to be solicited to.”

With all the games I have bought I have never felt I was being “solicited to” Hell Dead Space 3 didn’t know there was a store until I accidently pressed a button on the controller when I was at the vendor. Then all the stuff was all just vanity items, that I didn’t actually have a desire to get. /shrug

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Square Enix offering another mystery bundle to customers in the UK, which comes with five mystery PC games for £3.99. As before, customers will be unaware of the games they are purchasing in the mystery bundle, but the bundle contains triple-A titles worth £40 combined. One of Square’s previous mystery bundles contained Tomb Raider, Just […]

Shadow Tower, the first-person action-RPG developed for the original PlayStation by From Software, will be released on PlayStation Network. In the 1998 title, players took on the role of a mercenary who has returned home to the Holy Land of Zeptar to find the place has been sucked into the Underworld. He must use the […]

PlayStation TV has received a price cut in the UK. After several retailers started offering the console for less than the RRP of £84.99, users on DealSpwn began to wonder whether this is an official price cut, and not just regular deals or stock clearance. Sony later confirmed the new price of £44.99. “Starting from […]

You can download Forza Horizon 2 expansion Fast & Furious starting right now. Forza Horizon 2 Presents Fast & Furious is available to download now through Xbox Live for Xbox One and Xbox 360. The expansion is standalone, so you don’t need to own Forza Horizon 2 to play it. It’s also free from now […]

The 20th DLC for PayDay 2, the Butcher’s BBQ Pack, is now available on Steam. The DLC will run you $4.99/€4.99 and features: Piglet Grenade Launcher, 12G Steakout Shotgun and Mk1 Flamethrower Molotov cocktails and incendiary ammo Four new masks, patterns, materials and achievements The Butcher’s BBQ Pack is another co-development between Overkill and Croatian […]

Amid the current turmoil between Hideo Kojima and publisher Konami, one studio has offered the legendary designer a position. Lords of the Fallen developer Deck 13 took to Twitter to extend a job offer to Hideo Kojima. Dear Mr. @HIDEO_KOJIMA_EN In case you are currently searching, we have an open position as Head of Game […]

The question on every Destiny player’s lips today. And the answer, supplied by resident Destiny expert Paul Davies, is… Yes! We asked Paul whether or not he thought Xur’s Exotic weapon this week was worth the 23 Strange Coins. Here’s what he said: “It was already a great gun to own for PVP owing to […]

According to Final Fantasy 15 director Hajime Tabata, the main cast of the game is all-male because it makes the game “more approachable.” Final Fantasy 15 director Hajime Tabata spoke to Gamespot about the reason for his choice of making the core cast an all-male affair. “Speaking honestly, an all-male party feels almost more approachable […]

Blizzard has given Hearthstone expansion Blackrock Mountain a solid release date. Hearthstone’s Blackrock Mountain adventure pack will be released April 2 in the Americas region, and April 3 in Europe, Korea, Taiwan, and China. Blackrock Depths is the first wing to be released, others will follow one week apart. Other than the 31 new cards, […]

If you’re having issues loading your Bloodborne save after applying firmware update 2.50 to your PS4, this should help you out. Reddit user KBALLZZ encountered an issue after installing update 2.50 on his PlayStation 4. Bloodborne started reinstalling the day one patch again and when it was done he couldn’t continue his game or load […]

Sony is offering a 10% discount coupon to anyone looking to buy games on PlayStation Store this weekend. Sony’s latest discount coupon code is here. You’ll receive 10% off your cart total when buying from the PSN Store. The offer is not valid on purchases made on PS Vita, PlayStation TV, PSP, or in-game stores. […]

Dark Souls 2: Scholar of the First Sin will offer returning customers a chance to upgrade at a discounted price. Those who already own Dark Souls 2 on Steam and are interested in picking up the Scholar of the First Sin edition will be happy to know that publisher Bandai Namco is offering them an […]

Insight is one of the currencies in Bloodborne, but it’s also a mechanic that affects the gameplay. There are MASSIVE SPOILERS below, so turn back now or one of Bloodborne’s gameplay mechanics will be SPOILED for you. Just like Blood Echoes in Bloodborne, Insight is used to purchase certain items from vendors in the game. […]

The second phase of the April update for Xbox One is now open to members of the Preview programme and and it looks like there are even more features in store. Phase one of Xbox One’s April firmware update started a few days ago with improvements to party chat and achievements notifications. Today, phase two […]

As of patch 1.8 for GTA 5 on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, a few graphical issues have cropped up leading some to believe there has been a stealth downgrade to the game’s overall graphics. Over the past couple of days, Reddit went nuts over a video showing what appears to be a downgrade to […]

Xur: Agent of the Nine has arrived at The Tower in Destiny to rid you of your Strange Coins. Xur: Agent of the Nine has once again made it to Destiny’s Tower to sell you Exotic weapons and gear in exchange for Strange Coins and Motes of Light. For this weekend, Xur can be found […]

Destiny is finally getting the vault space upgrade players have been begging for almost since launch week. Destiny players can currently use vault space to store 20 pieces of amour, 20 weapons and 20 general item stacks. In the latest Bungle Weekly Update, the developer revealed that as of patch 1.1.2, due before House of […]

Half-Life 2: Update will be available tomorrow, and thanks to the modding community, those who own the vanilla version of the game can apply a visual update to the 2004 title. The comparison video shows you the differences between the original version, and the version with Half-Life 2: Update applied. Here’s what the mod includes: […]

You can now pre-download the free-to-play Neverwinter MMO on Xbox One. The game launches on March 31, but you will still need an Xbox Live Gold account to play it. Based on the Dungeons & Dragons franchise, the game can be downloaded from the Xbox Store.